Status Quo
by Baloo
Summary: Vignette. Alec on Logan, as he thinks about the whole handholding deal at the end of Freak Nation. If you don't like it, or don't “get it” -- go tell someone who cares.


**Disclaimer:**  Not mine.

**Summary:**  A short—Alec on Logan, as he thinks about the whole handholding deal at the end of 'Freak Nation'.

**A/N:**  I am adamantly anti-M/L, but I've never really had anything against Logan, just the relationship.  Still, I was all right with putting up with it in the show, just so long as I got my alternate-pairing fix through fanfiction.  But that little scene in FN really pissed me off, for various reasons…  Well, here's my look at it through Alec's eyes as I try to work past all the aggression.  Argh.

**-- Status Quo --**

You know, I used to respect you.

'Course, it's not like I went around shouting it at the top of my lungs, or doing some off-key rendition of 'You Are the Wind Beneath My Wings' or anything.  Well, there was that one incident—that time with the whole psychological manipulation and genetically enhanced hypnotist—but I'm hoping you pushed that memory out of your mind the way I kind of did with mine.

But I did.  Respect you, that is.  That whole noble, selfless thing you had going… I used to wonder if I'd be half the man you were—the type of person someone else might look up to one day.  Some sort of role model, I don't know.

I mean, I'm not saying I thought you were _perfect_.  Hell no, for each thing I could name that I admired about you, I could name another two that annoyed me to no end.

Sometimes you can be outdone by a wall in the whole 'interesting' department.

You're a bit self-righteous.  You were born with the proverbial silver spoon in your mouth and yet you expect people who've spent their whole lives scraping together just to make ends meet, to forfeit their own interests in order to fight for 'the greater good'?  Right.

And despite all your 'careful, Max', 'watch your back, Max' and whatever other cheesy way you come up with to give her that same damn message, you're awful quick to send the woman you supposedly love into danger for your 'missions'.  Yeah, she's genetically revved up and all… but still.

And what is with the stubble?  Man, can't you afford some razorblades?  Us working-class folks seem to manage, so I don't see why you can't.

But they were small things, nothing all too important in the grand scheme of things.

I've tried to blame Manticore for my own faults, for the fact that I couldn't be all that I saw in you.  But the truth is, it really doesn't matter.  Manticore's gone, thanks to Max, and that's a good thing, really.  Now it's just me, Alec, just another guy trying to make his way in this world.  If I want to be better, it's up to me.

See, I do take responsibility for myself, despite what Max may think.  Well, kind of.  I mean, I'd never say any of this out loud.  Never.  But to myself, I can admit it.

But like I said, I _used_ to admire you.  I _used_ to respect you.

Not any more.

You told me that you realized you were asking too much of Max to wait for you, to wait until you two found the elusive 'cure'.  You said you could understand her wanting to move on, even if _you_ never lost faith in what you had.  You could understand her wanting to be with 'someone like her'—even though it never mattered to you that she was different.  You told me to 'just treat her right'.

But you didn't give me a chance to make good on that.

I never figured you for the kind of guy to make a move on another man's girl.  Me, sure, why not?  Everyone was so quick to believe that one because, truth is, that's just the type of person I am.  The type of person I've wanted not to be, tried not to be.  Failed to be anything but.  Just so typically Alec to do something like that, to move in on poor little vulnerable Max, who just finally realized that there's no happy ending in sight for her and Logan.

Doesn't matter that I would never have done that, with you and Max, or with anyone else.

Doesn't matter that I've never really tried to get into Max's pants, not since I saw what was on between you two, even when she oh-so-adamantly insisted you weren't 'like that'.  Not that I didn't want to.

But I pushed my feelings aside because Max wanted _you_.  Not because I thought you could make her happy, since truthfully, I didn't.  But because she _wanted_ you, and sometimes it's all right not to be happy if it means having something that you want.

But really because it was the sort of thing I thought _you_ would do, or something that someone _like_ you would do.

I was wrong.

You once said you kind of envied me.  That you wished you were more of a 'free spirit', and how you thought it must be nice to be a 'happy-go-lucky sociopath'.  I didn't take you seriously.  Not then.  Can you blame me though?  I mean, that didn't seem like some deep, profound thought—just something off the top of your head that you tossed out there because you were thinking it and Mia was making us do the whole touchy-feely, out-in-the-open, group-hug thing.  Oh shit, I thought I had pushed that memory out of my head…

And maybe you meant it, at the time, but I didn't take it seriously.  Maybe I should have.

So you want to me like me, Logan?  You want to be the carefree 'sociopath' who goes around stealing other guy's girlfriends?  The kind of person who takes what he wants, expecting it to all come for free?

And all this time I wanted to be like _you_.

Funny how things work out sometimes, isn't it?  Funny, because when you were being you, and I was trying to be _like_ you, you would have won this little battle, hands down.

Now you're being like me, and me… well, I _am_ me.

So you're the type of man who'd hold hands with another guy's girl.  You'd make a move on your ex when she's supposed to be 'moving on' and you're supposed to be 'alright with that' because you 'just want her to be happy'.  Fine.  I guess you're not the guy I thought you were at all.  And the guy I thought you were doesn't even exist; he's just a figment of my imagination.

You don't know how much easier this makes it for me, because I never could have competed with _that_ guy.  But you, you're another story entirely.

And you dealt a low blow, but me—I was _made_ to fight dirty.

--fin--


End file.
